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Brandon Held - Life is Crazy
This podcast is designed to help with suicide prevention. That is the #1 goal! This is also a Podcast of perseverance, self-help, self-Improvement, becoming a better person, making it through struggles and not only surviving, but thriving! In this Podcast the first 25 episodes detail my life's downs and ups. A story that shows you can overcome poverty, abusive environments, drug and alcoholic environments, difficult bosses, being laid-off from work, losing your family, and being on the brink of suicide. Listen and find a place to share life stories and experiences. Allow everyone to learn from each other to reinforce our place in this world. To grow and be better people and help build a better more understanding society.
The early podcast episodes are a story of the journey of my life. The start from poor, drug and alcohol stricken life, to choices that lead to success. Discusses my own suicide ideations and attempt that I struggled with for most of my life. Being raised by essentially only my mother with good intentions, but didn't know how to teach me to be a man. About learning life's lessons and how to become a man on this journey and sharing those lessons and experiences with others whom hopefully can benefit from my successes and failures.
Hosting guests who have overcome suicide attempts/suicide ideations/trauma/hardships/difficult situations to fight through it, rise up, and live their best life. Real life stories to help others that are going through difficult times or stuck without a path forward, understand and learn there is a path forward.
Want to be a guest on Brandon Held - Life is Crazy? Send Brandon Held a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/brandonheld
Brandon Held - Life is Crazy
Episode 48: From NFL Player to Life Mentor: John Diggs Shows Us How to Love Life
John Diggs shares his journey from NFL player to successful mortgage broker to rock bottom, and how mind mapping became the tool that transformed his life and led to his current role as a "Mappineer" helping others find clarity and purpose.
• Former NFL player who lost everything in the 2007 mortgage industry collapse
• Used mind mapping to process self-help books during his lowest point
• Developed the "I Am Mind Map" technique to gain clarity about his core values
• Identified four anchors in his life: health, wealth, success, and happiness
• Went from rock bottom to a six-figure job within eight months using this technique
• Created "Mappineering" as a personal development approach using mind maps
• Written 10 books and given TEDx talks about mind mapping for personal growth
• Believes that visually organizing your thoughts helps with "active learning"
• Found that helping others discover their purpose is his greatest fulfillment
• Suggests everyone should create their own I Am Mind Map to live intentionally
Visit JohnDiggs.com and click on "visionary" to learn how to develop your own I Am Mind Map and start loving your life more.
Go to BrandonHeld.com and "subscribe to podcast" to get exclusive podcast episodes. Follow me on IG: BH_Life_Is_Crazy.
Want to be a guest on Brandon Held - Life is Crazy? Send Brandon Held a message on PodMatch, here: https://www.podmatch.com/hostdetailpreview/brandonheld
BrandonHeld.com iPad drawing for Life Coaching clients
Welcome. Welcome back to Brandon Held. Life is crazy and I got another great guest on my show today. His name is John Diggs. Now, John Diggs is a map and nearing mentor and I'll let him explain what that is in a little bit and he uses a transformative approach to personal development and he's very proud of what he does. He's very successful with what he does and that's why we have him on here today. So how are you doing today, John?
Speaker 2:I'm fantabulous, my friend Thanks for having me, man. This is awesome.
Speaker 1:Thanks for being a guest. I've been looking forward to this. You do your mind mapping and you work with some universities and you've done pretty well, so go ahead and just tell people a little bit about yourself.
Speaker 2:Oh yes, I was born and raised in Los Angeles, California Fell in love with football at an early age. That passion led me to Washington State University to play for the Cougs Go Cougs.
Speaker 2:Then from there I went on and played several years of professional football in the NFL and CFL and retired with a couple of screws in my right knee, got into the mortgage industry and parlayed in that after my football career and ended up owning one of the largest mortgage brokerages in all of Southern California in the early 2000s and living this pretty cool luxury, millionaire-like lifestyle. I made more money as a businessman than I ever did as a professional football player and life was great. I had the big houses, cars, wives, kids all of that good stuff. Then the mortgage meltdown hit in 2007 and basically just burned all of that stuff. Everything that I had was gone Houses, cars, even.
Speaker 2:I lost my family, my wife and kids. It was the lowest part of my life. It was rock bottom for me. I was jaded, I was lost, didn't know what to do other than just to move back to my mother's house, had no place to go really but to my mother's house, and when I went to my mom's I went with whatever I had left.
Speaker 2:I put stuff in storage and stuff, but when I went to my mom's, all I took with me was my mountain bike, a gym bag full of gym clothes and a big box that was full of motivational tapes, cds, dvds, things of that nature. I took that box because I knew I had to revisit all of that wonderful self-help information that was in that box to try to rebuild my life. And when I started going through that process, going through that box and figuring out where I was going to go, there was this one book in there called the Mind Map book by Tony Buzan, and I don't remember ever buying it personally, but it must've been given to me sometimes. But whatever reason, it resonated with me at this point. So I read that one first and made the decision afterwards to mind map all of the contents of that box. I started mind mapping books like Think and Grow Rich, unlimited Power all of the major self-help books that you can ever think of was in that box, and it spent three months of my life doing that.
Speaker 1:All right, I'm going to stop you right there. We're going to work our way to that part of your story. We're going to work our way to that part of your story. One thing we have in common we actually both lost our family and career and house.
Speaker 1:That's something I have in common with you as well. So I want to work my way to that because I want to get more into that. But let's just start with your childhood. You grew up and you played sports, obviously because you were able to go play football. What was your childhood like?
Speaker 2:Well, I was raised by a single mom. My parents divorced when I was, like maybe two years old, saw my dad every now and then, but when I did see him he was my hero, despite me not having ever lived with him, and so I sucked up a lot of his knowledge and the times that I would see him he would always share with some information. And the funny story is that he says that, son, I never forced you to play football, I just made sure I was throwing one at you every time I saw you. And that was true, you know, every time I saw him he'd be like catch deal, and that really he was really the catalyst of helping me fall in love with the game of football and I did all of the Pop Warner stuff and all of the things of that nature.
Speaker 2:My first love, like most, was the game of football. Every I lived it. I dreamed that I was that kid that went to bed with a football in his hand. I had to deal Nice yeah, bear, with a football in his hand, I do Nice. But all in all I had a great childhood, I would say. Naturally I experienced a lot of poverty and lack, but there was a lot of love. I had an abundance of love from all of my big families on both sides. My mom had eight brothers and sisters, my dad had eight brothers and sisters. I had a bunch of cousins and family and we were all a tight niche. I was really the only athlete. I had all of my relatives, so I was, I guess, the family star. When I was a little kid Everybody would come to my games just to see me do my thing, kind of deal.
Speaker 1:Yes, it felt like you had a happy childhood, even though you didn't have a lot, which I think is awesome. That just shows you that you had a great family, if they made you feel that way. But people always feel we don't have enough. Did you feel like you had to carry that torch for your family at all? Did you feel like you had to go be successful so you could help your family out?
Speaker 2:Not necessarily to help my family out per se, but, like I said, my father was like a hero in my neighborhood when I grew up A lot of times. I'm John Diggs II. He's the first, oh okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So I would run across a lot of my friends. Their parents knew my parents kind of deal, and I would always hear so much glowing, raving reviews about my father and my mother side of the family. They were actually a musical band in Los Angeles and was actually the band for Barry White for many years. So I had a celebrity like mom. Then I had this superhero like dad. I felt it and I made it mean that I had to be extraordinary because my parents was extraordinary, or I had to live up to these wonderful parents that I had deal. So that kept me out of a lot of trouble, which I'm excited about. I was like, oh, I couldn't do that. What would my dad think?
Speaker 2:that's good yeah so it really kept me out of trouble. But I didn't really think more like I wanted to succeed to like financially take care of my family. It was like I wanted to succeed to make my parents proud of me and my family, I guess, more proud of me and of what's possible. And again, I was always like the shining light in my family, since a kid being the only athlete. So I had that kind of I don't want to say pressure, but just that motivation to continually make them proud.
Speaker 1:I think pressure's fair. Yeah, obviously it was motivation, because you were motivated to succeed, but also you probably felt a little pressure to live up to what you could be for where you came from. That's great. What a great story you hear about athletes all the time feeling the pressure of needing to take care of their family because of where they came from and stuff like that. And I just I wasn't trying to stereotype you or anything.
Speaker 2:I just was curious what your background was.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, you did really well. Obviously, you got a scholarship. Who else gave you scholarship offers?
Speaker 2:I had scholarship offers out of high school, but they wanted me to run track because I was a top track runner and for some reason I made the poor decision not to run ever again after high school, which I wish I did. So instead of taking some of those scholarships, I decided to go to a junior college for one year, just to get a upgrade, my football soul offering. So then I had washington state, colorado, wyoming colorado state, colorado, was there, who else?
Speaker 1:oregon state it was a few schools that wanted me, I took.
Speaker 2:but due to the fact that I had those colleges wanting me out of high school, I took some recruiting trips then. Yeah, then I went to that one year junior college and I took more recruiting trips. So I took total like eight recruiting trips to all of these different schools. Utep was another one. University of Texas, el Paso it was cool. Funny thing is that Wyoming wanted me and I went up there, which probably was the most fun I had on all recruiting trips in Wyoming.
Speaker 2:Interesting yeah they took a snowmobiling and all of that. I'm a kid from LA. The whole experience for me there. But Dennis Erickson was the coach there.
Speaker 1:Oh, ok, yeah, I remember him.
Speaker 2:I didn't want to Wyoming, I wasn't thinking about it. But then, a week after my recruiting trip, he got the job at Washington State University.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And he asked me did I want to go there? And it was like a no-brainer for me because I already had a cousin there and I had five of my friends from Los Angeles already at Washington State. So it was like a dream come true to go to college with a lot of childhood friends and a cousin that already went there. So that's why Washington even though my heart was really leaning to play for Colorado Buffaloes because back then in the mid-80s Cordell Stewart and all of them, they won a national championship that year I really wanted to lean into there. But I would have been disowned by so many people if I would not have gone to Washington state, which I'm glad I did, cause it was a great experience.
Speaker 1:So, first of all, I'm a diehard college football fan. It is literally the only sport I watch anymore. I used to watch and play them all and the rest of them fell off my radar, and only college football survived. And, as a matter of fact, I'm starting a podcast in a month about, specifically, ohio State football, which is the team I'm a fan of.
Speaker 2:You're a Buckeye, I'm a Buckeye, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:But I have to say this the Washington State Cougars always represent. If you watch ESPN game day, they always have someone flying a Cougars flag. They always represent Always, always. It's special. Honestly, it's like you wouldn't expect it, because their alma mater's and their school itself isn't exactly huge Ohio State.
Speaker 2:So the fact that they can keep representing like that says a whole lot about this all in a special the palouse, a really special place, and for me to have that chapter of my life coming from big city la to a small little town in the state of washington, eight miles from the idaho border yeah, it was a. It was such a beautiful dynamic experience to see big city and live there to really open my perspective up about how big this world is.
Speaker 1:Yeah, different, it is everywhere.
Speaker 2:And how different it is.
Speaker 1:So do you guys feel like you had the number one pick in the draft this year? Because he did go to Miami, but he started at Washington State. That's where he made his name, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That was tough because we went to the Aloha Bowl in 1988. We were a great team. That was probably the best team I ever went on and played on. We beat the Detroit Eighth man in UCLA when they were number one. Yeah, we beat them in the Rose Bowl when they were ranked number one in the country at that time. But we were beating up everybody. We went to Tennessee, beat Tennessee like 52-14 and went to Illinois against Jeff George and beat them like 44-7.
Speaker 2:Nobody could stop our offense. That was the thing we ran to. Erickson brought that Trips open and people didn't know how to figure out how to stop it, and which, after that successful season, Miami came and took him and he won two national championships with that offense.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's how I knew him from Miami. I didn't even ask you, but I'm guessing. Since you had speed, did you play wide receiver?
Speaker 2:No, I played a free safety. I went there to play corner, but the fastest way for me to get on the field we were deep at corners. Both sides Wasn't deep at free safety and I played free safety in high school. Most of those guys back on the Pac-10 were 6'1", 6 feet and I was like 5'10" oh, a whole two inches shorter.
Speaker 2:I was a little smaller guy, but when it came to numbers and, yeah, I was competing and I was ranked number. That was the third free safety coming out of my senior year. When it came to stats, oh, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:You were getting track scholarship offers, so you had to have speed. Yeah, so yeah, that's cool. What a great experience.
Speaker 2:Awesome Blessing, blessing for sure.
Speaker 1:A life memory. You'll never forget that your whole life.
Speaker 2:And this quick story that I just shared. A football group I was speaking to in Bolingbrook Illinois a couple of weeks ago and I was telling them how, for one night, one night, we had a home game. It was against Stanford. It was on ESPN big game. We're in the tunnel, I'm starting free safety and ready to come out, and all of a sudden we were running out and the band started playing, crowd started roaring and I looked around and I just stopped and paused and literally started bawling. I was just crying because I realized that I was living that dream that I relived over and over in my mind as a kid of playing in a college football game. That was my goal was to play college football. I wasn't really a big professional guy. The energy of college was something I wanted to experience and when that hit me, that I achieved that goal. Man, it was just. I'll never forget it because I know all my teammates was running by me and I'm sitting there literally just yeah no, that's a great story.
Speaker 1:to me, there's no better sport than college football.
Speaker 2:There just isn't Energy the intensity, just the fandom, yeah, and I know why.
Speaker 1:That's not even why we're here. But I could get off, I could take a sideways turn and start talking about college football, the whole show with you, and I could even go into what a huge disappointment Jeff George was, with all the talent he had. I could go so many different ways, but all right. Great career at Washington State, great time. But it's time to graduate, it's time to go. Did you get drafted in the NFL.
Speaker 2:I did not. I made one of the poorest decisions of my life, and right after my senior season. Mike Zimmer I don't know if you heard of his name, I know Mike Zimmer for sure Mike Zimmer was head coach of the Vikings. He just was the defensive coordinator for Dallas Cowboys. He was our defensive coordinator at Washington State and he pulled me out of the shower after our last game and said, son, you had a great season. And, for whatever reason, a couple weeks later I was just so homesick that I just left school no just left.
Speaker 2:I was just done, I was over it. Pullman was just. I was just done and I left school and had some workouts and things of that nature, but in all intents and purposes of, any scout was coming to washington state after season was asking where's this guy that we see on film and that we heard about, and it was like we don't know where he is. He left, yeah, it was just a lack of focus, lack of purpose, lack of direction, lack of leadership. But one thing I did do that was really cool is that before I played any NFL football, I got my California real estate license. So I did go right home and started working towards getting my California real estate license. And, true story when I was the two years I was with the Raiders in 91, 92 in LA, I actually had 10, 15 listings on the market while I was playing football.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So despite not ever graduating and getting drafted, I did play professional football and I did get a degree, I guess you could say, in real estate. But my California real estate license is the fullness of that story. But that's just the authentic truth that, yeah, I just was a knucklehead, bonehead.
Speaker 1:It goes to show that you didn't really have a good male role model in your life, and so you, like me and like many other people, were left floundering, trying to make decisions based off what was going through your head, and you didn't have that male person you trusted to help point you in the right direction and, in this case, obviously, would have talked you into staying there and fighting through what you were feeling. I'm so glad you bring that up, because that is going to take us down the road that we're going right. I'm here, I'm doing this podcast, because I want to be a mentor to men and young males who don't have that, because I didn't have it, and I know that's the road we're going down for you as well. From this point, you get married and have kids.
Speaker 2:No, I played, like I said, five, six years. I didn't get married until I was like 30.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, once I started my mortgage career and got that up and running, I was like it's time to settle down and do that. So, yeah, I got married and started that chapter of my life when I was closer to 29, 30. I retired when I was 25, 26, so about four years after. Football is when I started that marriage chapter. And you didn't have kids then no, kid came shortly after. And you didn't have kids then no, he came shortly after.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay. And then you're living your real estate life right and you're being a husband, and then the market falls apart, like you talked about. You were living the dream. You had your million-dollar homes, your nice cars, all that was going on, and then the market drops out on, you Gone and you lose it all, and so now this is where I want to pick up where we left off. So, yeah, you know, get to go back to your mom, which is great Cause when that happened to me, I had no one to turn to. I was literally homeless, trying to figure out how I was going to survive. So at least you had that to fall back on, and that's awesome. And you thought enough. You were smart enough to bring this box along that had valuable information in it that you just hadn't taken the time to learn yet.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and the story just to add a little color to that story is that before going to my mom's or we had got evicted out of this apartment. My wife and kids and my wife we always had a kind of a challenging marriage. It was never just smooth, let's say that way, but she was going to just be moving about 30, 40 minutes away to her brother's house with my children I had a two-year-old or five and like a nine and they moved two-year-old or five and like nine and they moved in. The next morning I she gives me a call and tells me that they're not moving to Pasadena any longer. They're actually moving to Cottonwood, arizona, which is like seven hour drive from my house.
Speaker 2:And I didn't that hurt because I didn't really say goodbye to my kids like that, thinking I was going to see them and things of that nature. But with that I also had to go to that apartment to clean out the last bits of our stuff, ok, and went into my daughter's empty bedroom and it just felt like a Mike Tyson blow to the gut, man, it just buckled me. It was April 27, 2009. I buckled on the ground and cried like a baby that whole night. That was the only time I thought about ever suicide or just. It was just really a rough, rough night for me. But then the next morning, brandon, I woke up a new man. I woke up, my soul was cleansed, I survived death Like I was just reborn kind of deal, like that old me had died. So I wanted to share that with you, because when I went to my mom's house I didn't go there downtrodden.
Speaker 2:I went there with a feeling like I had a clear palette to rebuild my life, starting from zero. So when I went into that box and I took that box over there, that was the whole intent was to go through that box realizing that I just I'm starting from ground zero and now I just want to just rebuild my life's kind of deal from this context and you had.
Speaker 1:So you had suicidal ideations or thoughts and yeah, and a lot of people deal with that and a lot of people struggle with that, and so it's good to be open about that so people realize they're not alone and people deal with that and they go through it, and then they get through it and life goes on. That's a big, important part for people to understand.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and what stopped me was that I could not imagine hurting my mom or my kids. Yeah, I couldn't imagine having the people that love me spend the rest of their life in pain that I took my life yeah, I couldn't have that?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I totally understand that. I have three sons. There's been times I wanted to kill myself and the same thoughts run through my mind. I've even written goodbye letters a few times to each of my sons and one time I attempted suicide. It was not really intentionally I've told that story several times but I took an Ambien once and I had been thinking about taking the whole bottle.
Speaker 1:And I took an ambient, just one ambient, to go to sleep, and somewhere in my ambient stupor I decided to take the rest of the bottle and I almost died, but I didn't. I got saved. Someone called an ambulance for me and they saved my life and when they did that, I felt like I was given a second chance at life and I'm trying to make the best of it. And that's why we're here today, right now, because without that we wouldn't be here. So it's really it's really something I love to impress upon people that no matter how low you are, how low you feel, you can come out the other side and live a great, beautiful life. It's really important to me. All right, so let's just go through. You're at your mom's, you got your map and earrings box of stuff. You decide to map and near it all out. Where'd you go from there?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So one of the things that when I started mapping and all of the contents of that box by the way, this is leading into the TEDx talk that I did, where I fully go over it in the TEDx talk. So if anybody really want to see that, this really talks about how it all transformation, but just the high level of it is, after spending three months literally all day, every day, I had these big poster boards and I was just grabbing a book and I just started just learning how to mind map all of the contents of these books and they were very powerful because that started really resonating with me more than I've ever read a book before. And what I learned now is that mind mapping causes people to do what is called active learning. You know where most people read and it's more of a passive learning kind of deal. You're just sitting there absorbing information, but when you're mind mapping, you're actually reading sentences, paragraphs and chapters, thinking about what key word you can take out of there that resonates with you to add to your mind map. Sure, so you're more attached to the information. To add to your mind map. So you're more attached to the information. Then I started realizing well, I learned later that not only was it stimulating active learning, it was also triggering something called meaningful learning, meaning that I was attaching the new information to the old information that I knew. So when I was reading Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill, I would read something and I'd be like that's interesting, how does this connect to what I already know or some experiences in my past. So I wasn't just passively reading underlining, I was actually engaged, but I was actually connecting things in ways that I never read a book before, never read a book before. So it was, the information was resonating.
Speaker 2:And, brandon, after this three months of doing this, I came away with two key epiphanies, if you will. First one was that all of the thought leaders in that book Wayne Dyer, ed Cartola, tony Robbins, dale Carnegie, all of them in there they were all basically telling us one thing is that life is meant to be loved. They all had their different strategies, philosophies, systems, but that's all they was in essence talking about is try this approach to love your life more deal. And then I took that away. Wow, life is truly meant to be loved. Then the second thing I took out of that was that I am in control on how I love it. It's me to determine what loving life means. So that was like some huge aha moments for me.
Speaker 2:So after I spent those first three months of mind mapping those books, I spent the next three months developing what is now known as my I Am Mind Map, where I just started with just I am in the center and I just started asking myself some very deep, thought-provoking questions about who am I and what do I want in my life. And that process gave me so much clarity on who I am and what I want that I started vibrating differently. I started, I'm sure, walking differently. I just felt like it's empowered guy. So within total of eight months from moving into, my mom's house broke as a joke. Eight months after that I landed a high six figure paying job. That transformed my life and I know it was because of mind map.
Speaker 2:Because, mind mapping gave me so much clarity on who I am and what I need to do to be who I want to be in my life that I started doing mantras about it. I started believing it. I started. My energy was different. So when I walked into that interview it was a whole different vibe, where they had to have me and pay me what I asked for you know, just because you know I'm a huge believer in a lot of things you just said.
Speaker 1:The aura and the energy and the things you attract in life are what you attract, based off of what you're feeling and what you're bringing. I totally believe that a hundred percent. And what you're bringing, I totally believe that a hundred percent. And also I tell my kids all the time life is what you make it. If you think life is miserable, you're right. If you think life is great, you're right. It's really just what you think and how you look at it and how you decide to live it. Yeah, everything you're saying there resonates with me so well as well to live it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, everything you're saying there resonates with me so well as well. So I kept developing this. I am mind map and it was just a part of who I am. I just where. I just looked at it all the time because during that process just to backtrack a little bit I started asking myself what is most important to me, what is truly most important to me, and I landed on health. There's nothing more important to me than health.
Speaker 2:For those who aren't familiar with a mind map, a mind map is just a visual information management tool. In other words, it's a visual way to see whatever it is you got to think about. Whatever it is you got to think about, you got to set a goal, decision, problem solve, deal with stuff in your past, plan a trip, whatever is going on through your mind. A mind map is the way to visually organize it and structure it so you can gain greater perspective of whatever you're thinking about. So I took a mind map and I put the word I am in the center and I just started asking myself who am I? What's most important to me? And I landed on health is my most important deal.
Speaker 2:Then the next one I started asking what else is most important to me? Then I said I want wealth. So I put wealth on the mind map. So what else would be most important? I've landed on success. I wanted to be successful. Then the last one that I put, which I call an anchor, is happiness. So I had this map that had I am in the middle. Then I had health, wealth, success and happiness all extending from I am. Then what mind mapping does, which is so powerful? Now you can brainstorm each one of those. So I started what does health mean? That's so broad. So I said, after again, hours, weeks, and then, really thinking about this, I landed on physical health, mental health, spiritual health. That's what health means to me. Then I looked at wealth and I said was wealth truly money? I was like no, I've had money and I was miserable.
Speaker 2:But what else do I want an abundance of? I realized that wealth was like an abundance of something, so I landed on. I wanted a wealth of positive emotions, specialized knowledge, skills which I got from Think and Grow Rich, and I wanted a wealth of freedom, just to be free. I wanted a lot of freedom. Success I broke those down too. I wanted to be successful with my relationships, with my results and with my rewards. Then, when I looked at happiness, I said what will make me happy? I said that's feeling blessed for my past, grateful for my future and fulfilled in the present. So I had this map right here that I really just started exercising and developing for 10 years, from 2010, let's say to 2020,.
Speaker 2:In that process, my life was just nothing short of extraordinary. I made more money. That job that I got that paid me that money was a software developer, where I was building the mortgage computer systems for mortgage banks, something I knew how to do because I came from the mortgage industry and I was a tech dude. So it was a nice parlay for me but paid me a lot of money, gave me a lot of freedom, gave me everything that I had. On that I traveled, I did everything and living this great lifestyle reconciled a little bit with my family. I had everything back. I was an active dad and everything was just great.
Speaker 2:But then when the COVID hit and we were quarantined, that's when I got called to start writing books. Let me start sharing people about this mind map stuff, because it's really been doing great for me With the COVID I'm staring at walls, doing great for me With the COVID I'm staring at walls. Let me make the best use of my time. So I started writing books and since 2020, I've written 10 books. I became an international bestselling author. Yeah, I did TEDx talks. I've got all these courses and workshops and all of these different tools just to show people how to use a mind map.
Speaker 2:And last point, I come to realize that I'm the only one in the world that was teaching, promoting and talking about mind mapping as a personal development tool. Most people that's ever heard of mind mapping. They use it primarily for brainstorming, note-taking, project management, fortune 500 companies, ivy League schools. This is primarily what they use it for those who companies, ivy League schools this is primarily what they use it for those who's even heard of it. But once I knew that I was the only one that's really leading it as a personal development tool. That's when I felt that I needed to come up with my own name for my style of using a mind map, which is where mapineering comes from. Engineering beautiful mind maps. To love life more is the tagline for map and nearing, so I just wanted to share that distinction.
Speaker 1:No, that's a great story. It's like you went down this path and you saw the light, and not only did you see it for yourself, you wanted to help everyone else find it Exactly. And that's beautiful, because you could have just kept that to yourself, you could have just kept it within your family, whatever, but you decided everyone needs to know this, everyone needs to see this. And yeah, that's great, that's my passion.
Speaker 2:That's my purpose, you know that's my purpose. That's my purpose and that's what I really try to tell people is that when you develop your own I am mind map, you just an amazing feeling to know every day that you're walking with your purpose, versus just doing a job or existing.
Speaker 1:So if I'm John Smith listening to this podcast and I want to learn about your mind mapping strategy, what do I need to do?
Speaker 2:JohnDiggscom and then you can click on visionary. I believe that we're all visionary. Especially those who are have a vision for their future and their life. So there's a link on there that says visionary. You just click that and it'll just guide you through the process to show you exactly what you can do to start developing your own IMI mapping.
Speaker 2:I say, brandon, that I've worked with a lot of people over the years and regardless if you're a teenager or in your seventies, regardless if you're wealthy or you're got meager accommodations kind of deal or wherever you're at in the spectrum culturally, wherever that is, getting being able to actually visually see the key components of what's most important into you, into your life. It's so powerful because most people never really took that time and be like, all right, who am I? Yeah, and consciously decided who they are, really got clear with it and be able to visually see it. That is so empowering and illuminating and inspiring and it's just fulfilling in certain ways because you can look at it and be like, yeah, this is who I am and you can say it with congruency and all of that stuff, and that's why I encourage everyone out of the thousands of possible mind maps people can make. There's none more important than that. I am mind map to get clear on who you are and what you want in your life.
Speaker 1:I agree with you, hell. I think this is something they should teach in school across the country, because a lot of people are lost and don't know who they are, and they don't know how to figure out who they are and what they want. That's my passion. No, it's beautiful, and so I want people to know how to get to you and get to this and learn how to do this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, johndickcom, and I'm so passionate about it. This is truly my life's mission. I played football, I did all that stuff. Nothing really resonated with my soul like helping people in this way. I'm just so clear with it that anybody interested don't hesitate to reach out to me. I would love to help you in any way possible to love your life more.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's great. That's another thing people need to understand is just how rewarding it is helping other people. I feel like if everyone just had a better understanding of that, this world would be so much a better place. There's nothing in life that I've ever done for myself that has been as rewarding as what I've done for other people. It's like a high.
Speaker 2:You want to keep chasing, you want to help more people, and it's just an amazing feeling and I'm open to believe that God Almighty universe communicates through us, through our emotions, yeah, and since we feel so good helping others, that's probably what he wants us to do.
Speaker 1:No, I agree, agree, yeah, totally agree.
Speaker 2:he wants us to do more of that, and anytime you feel bad about something, he probably doesn't want you to do that you don't yeah nothing no I try to stay in that lane, and the more I do it and I say this a lot is that the more you commit to loving your life, even by helping others love their lives. It seems like life will always yes, always find ways to help love you back. Life will love you back when you love it truly. You know what I mean, what we were saying. You put out bad energy. Life is going to give you bad energy. You put out loving energy and you find ways to love just the fact that you're breathing life will give you more of that back. And that's the key point a lot of people don't really think about.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and to piggyback on that, I think truly happy people truly not pretending, not social media happy. Truly happy people want to help other people and want other people to be happy as well. Miserable people want other people to be miserable. Misery loves company, so we just need to get this out there and we need to have more people be happy. So it's literally like a virus that we can spread in a good way. All right, john, this I'm gonna wrap this up here. This has been great and, yes, very eye-opening and what an amazing thing you have put together and seriously, not enough people could get this. I genuinely mean, if they could teach this in every elementary school across America, that would be amazing.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to impact that.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to impact that yeah please do, because, man, how great would this be. As we're leaving, what would you like to leave with people, like final words, how to get in touch with you? We know johndiggscom, but anything else you want to leave with the people?
Speaker 2:I'm on all social medias and, like you, just heard that I'm really committed and passionate about just helping other people sort out their lives, get clear on who they are so they can start living intentionally, on purpose, to love and live their best life. And I'm here to help. I'm a service, I'm on a divine mission and if anybody has any questions or need any guidance, please don't hesitate to reach out. I'm on all social medias. You can find me just John Diggs. I'm all over the place, so that's.
Speaker 1:I'm here for you.
Speaker 2:I love you and I appreciate you. Thank you so much for having me, Brandon. This was awesome.
Speaker 1:No, it's been my pleasure. Everything you've said and talked about has been enlightening and it's a learning experience for everyone, and you're doing a big part of helping people learn and become better people, and I always love people like that. That's Diggs with two Gs, by the way, john.
Speaker 2:Diggs. Can you dig it?
Speaker 1:Can you dig it, john Diggs, with two Gs? And now for me, if you could go to brandonhellcom and subscribe to my podcast. It's right there at the top of the page Subscribe to podcast. I have a new version where, you know, for 10 bucks a month, you're helping out the show and I throw a few extra podcasts in there that only subscribers can listen to, and we're on a mission here to help people and you're going to help us help people by subscribing to my podcast for a measly $10 a month Nothing.
Speaker 1:And then, finally, I also am on social media. I'm on Instagram at BH underscore life is crazy. And then I'm on YouTube at Brandon held underscore life is crazy. So please follow me on those formats and if you let me know that you followed me from my podcast, I will follow you back in return. So just shoot me a message and let me know, and we appreciate you listening, as always, because we understand your time is valuable and you're giving us one of your most precious resources, which is time, and we thank you for that, and we never take that for granted, and I'll talk to you next time.
